A Hideous Beauty (9 page)

The man in the wheelchair checked his watch. “It's later than I thought,” he said. “You're right, I'm afraid this is a bad time. I have a class starting in a few minutes. If you'll check with my assistant, maybe we can find some time for you.”

“Professor Forsythe?” I'd mistaken the professor for the student.

The man in the wheelchair turned in the direction of the book stacks. “Miss Ling!”

An attractive, young Asian woman stepped from between the rows of metal shelves. Brilliant black hair fell to her shoulders and swayed with each step. Her attire separated her from the other female students whose standard uniform seemed to be jeans and a sweatshirt. She wore stylish, black slacks and a silky, red-and-white
blouse with splashes of color that suggested flowers. She moved to the professor's side and looked as though she belonged there.

“Miss Ling,” the professor said, “this young man would like to make an appointment with me for today.”

She glanced at me and shook her head. “I'm sorry, Professor,” she said. “You have no time available today.”

“You're Professor Forsythe?” I asked.

The man with the broad shoulders still hadn't moved. He sat hunched over. His head down. He acted as though we weren't there.

“Professor, I apologize,” I said, this time to the man in the wheelchair, “but it's urgent I speak to you. I'm flying to Washington, D.C., tonight.”

“D.C.? Do you live there?”

“I have an apartment there. Don't use it much.” I stretched out my hand to him. “Grant Austin.”

Some men feel at a disadvantage shaking a man's hand from a seated position. Not this man. Seated, he was a presence to be reckoned with. He had a prominent nose, intelligent, sky-blue eyes, and an easy smile. He spoke with the slightest hint of a Scottish brogue. “You're a lobbyist?” he asked.

“He's a writer,” Miss Ling said.

Our heads turned toward her in tandem.

“You know Mr. Austin?” the professor asked.

“Of him,” she said.

“Are you acquainted with his work?” the professor asked.

“You've read my book?”

She spoke to the professor. “He's written a biography of the president. It won the Pulitzer.”

The professor was delighted. “The sitting president? Do we have it?”

Without so much as a glance at me, Miss Ling went to find the book.

Leaning toward the man hunched at the table, Professor Forsythe said softly, “I suppose we can continue this tomorrow?”

The man said not a word. He shoved back his chair and rose to impressive height. His broad shoulders seemed to unfold even broader. His bearing was powerful, knocking me back a step.

To the professor, he confirmed, “Tomorrow.”

Turning to leave, he looked at me for the first time. His face registered surprise; then, anger and distaste. He paused. His eyes turned hard as marble, like those of a Greek statue. His mouth twisted with such deep loathing I felt a strong compulsion to apologize, though I didn't know for what.

The moment passed and he strode away.

His reaction to me hadn't gone unnoticed. The professor was intrigued. “Who did you say you are?” he asked.

Miss Ling returned with my book. She handed it to the professor, who examined the cover, front and back. He compared me to my publicity photo with a chuckle. He scanned the copy on the dust-cover flaps, the table of contents, and the first few pages. After that, he began thumbing.

“Have you read it?” he asked without looking up.

“Yes,” Miss Ling replied.

“And?”

Miss Ling shot a nervous glance in my direction. “It won the Pulitzer.”

The professor lowered the book “That's not what I asked.”

I sensed a bad review coming. If she liked the book she wouldn't have hesitated to say so.

“Pedantic,” she replied. “Contrived. A public relations piece.”

“What?” I cried. That was the second time in as many days someone called my writing pedantic. I liked it even less the
second time around. I rose to my book's defense. “Miss Ling, I'll have you know—”

My book hit the table, cutting short my rebuttal. “Miss Ling . . .” the professor said.

On cue she began gathering up papers and books from the table in preparation to leave.

The professor placed a hand on her arm. “Miss Ling. I'm going to stay here and talk to Mr. Austin. Please start my class for me.”

Miss Ling scowled. She directed her displeasure at me.

The professor gave her instructions. “They're supposed to have read the chapter on General Revelation,” he said. “Discuss the material with them. If it becomes apparent they are ill-equipped for the discussion, give them a pop quiz. There's a list of questions in the front of my book.”

Her gaze was dark and cold and unwavering. She didn't like me.

“Miss Ling . . . ?”

She gathered up her things and was gone.

The professor folded his arms. “Two for two, Mr. Austin. Do you always have this effect on people?”

I was as perplexed as he was amused. “Honestly, Professor, I'm a very likable guy.”

The professor motioned toward a chair. “How about if you have a seat and explain to me what's so important it's keeping me from my class.”

“Yes . . . well . . .” Now that I'd gained a hearing, I wasn't sure how to begin. I took the chair vacated by the brooding giant. “All right . . . I'm going to mention a name and I want you to tell me if you recognize it.”

“Are you testing me, Mr. Austin?”

“Believe me, Professor, that's not my intention. If you'll indulge me.”

I took his silence as consent. I let a significant pause cleanse the air and I readied myself to judge his reaction. “Semyaza.”

He didn't blink.

“Do you recognize the name?” I asked.

“I do.”

“Can you tell me in what context?”

Tilting back his head, he studied me a moment. “No,” he said.

“No?”

“I prefer you to set the context, Mr. Austin.”

His reluctance indicated he was leery of my intentions. Fair enough. He didn't know me. “What if I told you I might have met someone who is using the name Semyaza for reasons unknown. What would you say to that?”

“I'd say the phrasing of your question indicates you've been hanging around too many politicians.”

I grinned. “All right. Let me rephrase.”

“Now you sound like a lawyer.” The man had a quick wit and wasn't afraid to use it. I like that in a professor.

I tried again. “What would you say if I told you I met someone who called himself Semyaza?”

“I'd say someone was playing a practical joke on you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a class to teach.”

“Professor, wait! Please . . . this is important. Have you heard the name Semyaza used in any other context than . . . than . . .”

“Than what, Mr. Austin?”

I swallowed hard. “Than angels,” I said.

He leaned back. “First, you tell me you've met someone named Semyaza. Then, you ask me if Semyaza can be anything other than an angel. Mr. Austin, are you telling me you've seen an angel?”

“No! An angel? Of course not! It's just that . . .” I sighed
heavily. “Frankly, Professor, I don't know what I saw, or if I really saw it.”

For a long time, the professor said nothing. “What is it you want from me, Mr. Austin? You're an intelligent man. I find it hard to believe you came all this way to ask me something you could have looked up in an encyclopedia.”

I leaned forward, forearms on knees, and stared at my hands. Why was I so reluctant to tell him what I saw? What's the worst he could say to me? Taking a deep breath, I said, “I had an experience I can't explain. An unusual encounter. Highly unusual. And during that encounter, I heard the name Semyaza.”

“You heard the name?”

“Yes.”

“Spoken aloud, or in your head?”

I had to stop and think. I closed my eyes and tried to hear the voice again. Not this time. I remembered it being unmistakably strong. Thunderous. I not only heard it, I felt it. It shook the room.

“It was audible,” I said with conviction.

“Tell me exactly what you heard.”

“Well . . . it didn't sound like a single voice, but more like a chorus of voices. It said, ‘I am Semyaza. Tremble before me.' ”

The professor cupped his chin in his hand and thought. When he looked up, he reached for my book. “Tell me, Mr. Austin,” he said. “What exactly is your relationship to the president of the United States?”

The sudden change of topic caught me off guard.

“Um . . . I hold no official position in the White House, if that's what you're asking, though I have access to it. I have a desk at my disposal for the next six months while we publicize the book. I'm a freelance writer. But what does this have to do with—”

“What brings you to California?”

“I'm a graduate of Singing Hills High School. I came back to speak at an assembly.”

“That explains all the news trucks on Madison Avenue yesterday. It made me late for class.” He set my book in his lap and folded his hands on top of it. “So, Mr. Austin, describe this encounter you had. When did it happen?”

“You believe me?”

“Let's just say I'm being polite. I don't know what you're up to, but you don't strike me as a man of guile. And, quite frankly, Mr. Austin, you intrigue me. I've never seen people take such an instant dislike to anyone like they do you.”

“Do you know of any good Dale Carnegie courses?” I deadpanned.

“The encounter. When did it take place?”

“Yesterday. Following the assembly.”

“Where?”

“At the high school.”

The professor's eyebrows arched.

“In a teacher's office.”

He laughed. “That's where you heard the chorus of voices, in a high school teacher's office? Are you acquainted with the teacher?”

“We were high school rivals.”

“And did he or she also hear the voice?”

I hesitated. “Not exactly.”

How far was I willing to go with this? If word got out the president's biographer was hallucinating in California or consorting with gargoyle spirits, it was all over for me. The tabloids would eat it up.

To his credit, the professor respected my hesitation. He didn't press me.

“I went to his office to gloat,” I said.

As concisely as possible I narrated my history with Myles
Shepherd and described how he tried to claim credit for my book's success, which prompted the professor to examine it for a third time.

“Is that when he told you to tremble before him?” the professor asked.

He sensed there was more. I could see it in his eyes. Somehow knowing that made the telling easier.

I told him how the light from the classroom stopped at the office threshold; how I was rendered immobile; about the gargoyle things in the corner; how the room trembled and Myles Shepherd changed into a being of incredible light, all at once wondrous, then painfully draining; how the gargoyle things plunged into me; and how it all climaxed with the thunderous command to tremble before Semyaza.

Throughout the narration, the professor remained solemn. Stoic.

I described what it was like sitting in the parking lot, the muddy colors and nauseating odors. It surprised me how easily it all came out once I started, and how relieved I was to be able to tell someone. I told him everything. Everything except the part about the plot to kill the president. I left that out. I'm not sure why, it just seemed the right thing to do.

With a toss of my hands I signaled the end of my tale. He said nothing at first, just stared thoughtfully out the window at the desert garden. When he spoke, it was as though he dredged up his voice from a deep pit.

“A hideous beauty,” he said.

His response was so unexpected, I didn't catch it the first time. He repeated it for me.

“A hideous beauty. Wondrously alluring. Incredibly evil.”

“That's it!” I cried. “That's it exactly!” A sense of relief washed over me. He not only believed me, he understood!

“Where is he now?” the professor asked.

“Myles? Well, actually . . . he's dead. Killed this morning in an accident on the freeway.”

The professor's jaw clenched. His hands balled into fists. “No,” he said. “He's not dead.”

“I saw the car, Professor. The charred body. It was him. You have to know Myles, he's not the sort of guy who would loan his car to—”

“That wasn't him,” the professor snapped. “Believe me, he was not killed in that car.” Anger flashed in his eyes. So strong was his reaction, it took him a moment to fight it back.

My book hit the table with a thud.

“Why you?” he said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Why you? What aren't you telling me?”

The question hit me hard. How did he know I was holding something back?

The book lay between us.

He was an intelligent man. He could see that this wasn't about a freelance writer. This was about the president. It was a logical conclusion.

But matters of national security were not something to be taken lightly. Telling a theology professor about an assassination plot against the president of the United States before warning the president himself didn't seem wise. Then again, I'd come this far. Maybe he could help me understand how Semyaza fit into the plot.

I decided to take a chance on him. “He told me my work wasn't finished. That I was to write one final chapter. A chapter that would record the president's assassination.”

The professor nodded an emotionless nod. Did nothing alarm this man?

He released the brakes on his wheelchair. “Mr. Austin, I suggest you find yourself a very big hole and hide in it.”